Steel Tango Part 4 - Health

We went back to the steel mill on Tuesday morning. It was a lovely spring day. We were ready to work. But wait. Were we healthy enough to work in a steel mill with extremes of temperature and the aura of sulfurous fumes drifting through the air. We had to be given a physical exam. My Spanish is not too good. I was laughed at back in the seventies in Madrid when I tried to buy train tickets; and that was when my Spanish was better. I puzzled out the questions, and deciphered the pantomime enough to answer the questions and then get an EKG. Apparently I was fit for the job. I wondered why they made it so difficult to allow someone to solve their problems. Perhaps they truly were concerned for my well-being.
We passed through security, with a bit more scrutiny this time. I am used to security checks by now. I am always the ‘random’ person in the airport who has to be thoroughly searched and wanded. I know without looking that my boarding pass will have SSSS stamped on it and I will be singled out. I am used to the stares of fellow travelers who know I must be a terrorist. This time was easy. They checked our passes, our PC cases, wrote down the serial numbers and we were on our way.

Steel Tango Part 3 - Meat

We survived and actually became inured to brushing other vehicles. I no longer winced passing within two or three inches of other cars. I did learn that any card would work since it is not electronic but that was not until later.
Once we were settled into the hotel we went to dinner. Now, dinner begins at 8:30 PM. No one eats before then. We went to one of the two restaurants that our man in Argentina would recommend in that town and had our first Argentinean meal. Argentines eat meat. That’s it, meat, and beef at that. The best beef I ever had, and inexpensive, but just meat. You can order a side order of potatoes which I did, but as far as green veggies go, they were nowhere to be seen. So we had beef, filet mignon, and French fries. It was delicious. The meal was followed by ice cream. I could feel the cholesterol rising. At lunch throughout the week we went to the other restaurant, and instead of filet mignon I had grilled sirloin. This was repeated all week, with one exception. I had chicken once, and added fruit to my breakfast, for health reasons.

Steel Tango Part 2 El Commandante

We went easily through security and to the meeting. There were four of us from my company, two Argentines (I will call them Martin and Eduardo, just to protect their identity, they are absolutely wonderful men, among the most hospitable I have met.), a Frenchman, Pierre (brilliant, warm, great guy) and myself (no comment). We were meeting with the project leader, Luis. Now it is important to remember the purpose of our visit. We were here to fix problems arising from changing the software that controls a steel rolling mill. This facility has ovens that heat huge slabs of steel to over 1000 degrees C and sends them down a line to be squashed to about one eighth their original thickness. Of course they also get much longer. It is awesome, in the original sense of the word. Well the software controls the machines that do all this, so when there is a problem it can be in Luis’ words “catastrófico”.
Luis was dressed in a khaki uniform, the standard for professionals who work in the mills. I immediately, in my warped mind, gave him the nickname ‘El Commandante’ (see photo of Luis in his spare time). He would smile once in a while but behind it there was always an implied ‘you better fix it now.”
We also met with his boss, a dour man in a suit and tie who appeared to be suffering from chronic indigestion. We assured them that we were on the case and would be back bright and early the next morning to perform all kinds of wonders.
Then we went to town, to our hotel. I am not exactly sure of what I was expecting in the city we went to. I knew it was about the same size as the city I live in and I had seen it more or gogglen Google Earth. But let me just say I was unprepared. I will call the city San Miguel. Downtown is about ten miles from the steel mill. The road there was a two lane highway, with three lanes of traffic. I sat in the backseat. I prefer the backseat because the driver can’t see my white knuckles. We passed many cars from the 60s I think the best image would be the atmosphere from ‘The Last Picture Show’. I was fascinated. There is no idea of zoning or front yards so auto body shops were abutting upper-crust houses and car dealerships were cheek bybarbecueth barbeque shacks.
When we got to downtown proper Martin just went straight through each intersection, as did all the cross traffic. I put my trust in him and Dios mio.

Steel Tango, Part 1

One of the nice things about my job is that once in a while I get to travel to far away places. One of the bad things about my job is I get to travel to far away places. Last week I went to Argentina.

I work for a global corporation that does industrial automation. This is the reason why it is sometimes less-than-perfect in traveling. Most places where they have heavy industry are not the same places where tourists flock. So for instance if I were to travel to the States I would not normally be called into Honolulu or San Francisco or New York City, but more likely Detroit, Toledo or Flint.

So it was this time. I took the 11 hour flight to Buenos Aires, and it would have been great to stay there. I felt very ‘New York’. But, no, I was picked up by a company colleague and whisked to the Argentine Immigration Bureau. It appears that while you do not need a visa to travel to the country you need to pay for a ‘work’ visa to contribute to their economy. There was a French engineer also sent there to solve the problem and we got a taste of Argentine bureaucracy. My company had hired an ‘expert’ to facilitate the process but it still took two and a half hours to receive the stamped sheet of paper that said we could work there.

Once we were legal, we headed out to the site. It was in a mid-sized city 250 Km from Buenos Aires over the flattest land I have seen, and I have been to Indiana. It was interesting, for the first twenty minutes. Then I realized that all cattle farms look alike and the occasional sheep or llama ranch was not enough to vary the view. I dozed on and off until I was jolted awake because we were on a pot-holed dirt road. I was informed that since we were in a hurry (we had a 3:30 meeting scheduled and it was 5:00 PM) we were taking a short-cut. And sure enough 15 bone-jarring minutes later we pulled into a gleaming modern office building, with lovely blooming violet jacaranda trees (see photo, actually the tree in the photo is in Buenos Aires). Just from the sulfur scent overwhelming what I assumed were the floral overtones I know this was the only gleaming modern building on the site.